Drunk Movie Review/Synopsis: Serena

After seeing great performances and chemistry between Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper in American Hustle & Silver Lining Playbook, I thought this might be a little hidden gem in the Netflix library. Unfortunately, it turned out to be another example as to why you should always listen to your Netflix suggestions when it tells you a movie sucks!

Other than being curious to see Lawrence and Cooper together again, the only reason anyone might accidentally start to watch this piece of garbage is because they got the title mixed up and confused with the 1997 film Selena. This film is so horrible!

So Bradley Cooper is one of few successful business men in post depression Carolina. I’m pretty sure it’s North. Anyway, he’s a lumber Tycoon and it turns out his cash flow is starting to dry up & the sheriff in this town of what looks like maybe 20 people wants to use some of his land as a National Park.

On a side note, I am just going to use the names of the actors that play these characters. The story is so shitty that it doesn’t even really matter. Shortly into the film, Bradley Cooper (Pemberton) witnesses Jennifer Lawrence (Serena) riding a horse. After Cooper inquires about her to a friend, he is basically told in the nicest way possible “um that girl has issues” I guess her family all burned to death in a house fire when she was little. Yup, that will do it! So, Cooper does what any rational & normal person would do. He literally introduces himself by riding his horse beside her and says “I think we should be married” I guess she understands the language of crazy because in the blink of an eye they are married and flash forward.

Everything starts going to hell due to some questionable land that Cooper owns in Brazil. As a result, Cooper’s business partner is trying to jump ship and get out of the partnership. After his partner threatens to basically turn on him, Cooper kills him in the woods. This story line ends pretty quickly. From this point on, it’s basically just Cooper & Lawrence.

Cooper has made his crazy wife a partner in the business. None of the workers really like Lawrence. The only exception is this one guy whose life she saved. He considers her part of a prophecy and dedicates himself to her. They never really elaborate any further on that. She practically just turns him into her dirty errands boy. More on that later. Anyway, It turns out Cooper has a bastard son from a local women he knocked up. He certainly won’t win any votes for “father of the year” since he doesn’t pay any attention to the child. The mother pretty much raises him on her own. Lawrence doesn’t care, at least not yet.

Lawrence tells Cooper she is pregnant but eventually has a miscarriage and is told she can never have kids. All the sudden, Cooper picks the worst time to have a heart and start caring about his bastard child. Lawrence finds out and goes bat shit crazy. She then asks her loyal errand boy to go kill the child and mother. Wow, that got dark fast!

I think the mother and child move to Tennessee. It doesn’t matter though. Apparently, Lawrence’s errand boy is a Terminator and has the ability to appear in another state within the blink of an eye. As he goes to hunt them down, Cooper finds out that Lawrence organized a hit on them. Since the mother and child are in danger, Cooper agrees to turn himself into the sheriff in 24-hours (for the murder of his partner & his shady logging deals I think?) if the sheriff tells him what state his bastard and the mother relocated to. On a side note, this sheriff sucks. Lets break this down for a minute. Lets pretend your a cop and you figured out that someone was in serious danger in another state. Wouldn’t you do something to try and alert the authorities in that state!? Isn’t that what police do? Instead he just agrees and gives Cooper the location. Cooper hops in a car and drives to the state. Long story short, he saves them just in time.

Afterwards, instead of turning himself in, Cooper goes to the woods to try and fulfill some stupid dream of hunting a Panther. Why? I have no frigin idea. This dream is something he would regret though. The Panther kills him. That’s pretty much the end.

Instead of a Panther, maybe he should hunt the writer of this movie!

The Major Issues I Have

I don’t even know where to begin! First of all, everyone stares in this movie. I’m not kidding. Everyone is always looking off at nothing or each other for long periods of time without muttering a single word. You could make a drinking game out of how many times someone just looks off for five seconds. During these gazes at nothing, you can practically sense the actor thinking to themselves “why the hell did I sign up for this!?”

I’m just gonna stare at you!

Oh, wait! I almost forgot to mention the dialogue. That’s right. It sucks. They could have gotten a bunch of robots in a room and it would have had the same effect. How can you forget such memorable lines that are delivered coldly like “I have a child inside of me.” Furthermore, Bradley Cooper has this horrible accent that sounds like a bad impersonation of J.F.K at times. What the hell is that all about? Also, on multiple occasions characters try to hide things in obvious places for other characters to easily find them. It’s like “geeee let me lock this away so nobody can find it” but the key for it is in the unlocked draw next to it?!

Score: 2/10

Pros:

+ I honestly can’t think of any, but if I am really going to reach for one, I guess I will go with the 3 horrible sex scene clips between Lawrence and Cooper